Posted on 06/14/2010 12:04:54 PM PDT by NoLibZone
Here's a dose of reality.
The father of teen sailor Abby Sunderland told The NY Post that he's broke and had signed a contract to do a reality show, "Adventures in Sunderland," about his family of daredevil kids weeks after she set off on her doomed and dangerous solo sail around the globe.
Laurence Sunderland, a sailing instructor who lives in the middle-class Los Angeles suburb of Thousand Oaks with his pregnant wife and seven kids, opened their home to film crews four months ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I don’t know what Obama wants to do with BP.
I know that BP should be sent a bill for the cost of the cleanup.
What, are you saying that BP should be able to spill oil on your front yard and not have to pay to clean it up?
Getting out of bed in the morning involves at least some risk.I know that kids die in car accidents.I worked in a major hospital's ER for 20 years.But you know...the funny thing is that driving is something that Americans take for granted and many first learn to drive when they're 16-18 years old.OTOH,no more than 0.0001% of 40 year olds would even consider circumnavigating the earth alone.Why? Too dangerous.And they'd be correct.
And yet,to some here,a 16 year old kid doing it is just duckey.I have no problem with the kid wanting to do it.My problem is with the *parents*.Period
I know that I won't change any minds here.I also know that my mind won't be changed.
I'm done with this thread.
No you're not. You'll carry this thread with you till your dying day! Mwuahahahaha!
Good point! They do have younger kids than Abby who still have the chance of granting Pimp Daddy's wish to have one of them set the record.........
There's a lot of potential right there in Pimp Daddy's reality TV deal.......With all those kids, this program could run for at least the next 9 years, which will be the age of the soon to be newborn child, the last of the Pimp Daddy clan to attempt to sail around the world in an attempt to set a new record for the youngest ever at 9 years of age.
Go Pimp Daddy!
Go Pimp Daddy!
Go Pimp Daddy...........!
Arguably, Farragut didn't have a ship as seaworthy as what Abby had. He'd have found himself with his hands quite full, thank you very much, had he encountered the conditions that overtaxed the mast on her vessel. Farragut didn't have sattelite communications or GPS. Was he an idiot to sail halfway 'round the globe, and then to engage in live fire exchanges with ruthless men who'd as readily slit his throat as speak to him??
Or maybe you draw a distinction only in that Farragut's proud father didn't go and get a nice book deal inked while the young Admiral-to-be was off to sea??
And, does it occur to anyone else that every posted expression of upset over this news story inherently implies a demand for exactly the kind of government proscription of personal choices that is THE central subject of acute, and incessant condemnation in, and in fact the entire raison d'être for, this forum??
Posters are always around here bitching, moaning, and howling about government imposing itself in thier lives in ways that limit PERSONAL CHOICES, then, when someone makes a PERSONAL CHOICE that government hasn't yet found a way to eliminate, here they are — in a flagrant display of hypocrisy — bitching, moaning, and howling about that.
Well, wth "conservatism" like that, who needs liberalism?
DO you want; government intrusion, or do you not?!
You "conservatives" had better make up your stinking minds, 'cuz only Liberals and bisexuals get it both ways!
That's a useless argument because her Pimp Daddy gave her the permission......
Let me ask you this, what if she had died? And she definitely would have if her rescue beacon would have malfunctioned..........Would you have the same support of her parents that you have right now?
This kid wasn't transporting troops to the beaches of Normandy.Warfare's just a tad different.And Farragut wasn't 16.
And, does it occur to anyone else that every posted expression of upset over this news story inherently implies a demand for exactly the kind of government proscription of personal choices....
I'm nauseated by the lack of *parental* proscription.
Well of course nobody’s outright SAID the government should have prevented this; my point was that that is the underlying implication. Nobody has to actually SAY, “There ought’a ba a law” for some liberal nutjob in Congress to actually sit down and hack one up; the implied need for one, as manifest in the bitching and moaning of the many, is more than sufficient impetus.
And furthermore, had Abby’s mast NOT broken; had she actually completed the voyage sucessfully, you’ve got to admit that you’d be right here on this same forum authoring posts that gush with pride over how America can still turn out kids whose visions and dreams haven’t quashed by the dour prognostications and magic of thinking teeny-weeny that are the constant brain-food of the mind-numbed Left.
Oh, but let that young visionary fall just a wee bit short; let them be bested by the forces of Nature; and here you are, instead, sawing away about how stupid it was to let her try it in the first place, how she “was not up to the task” and her parents were irresponsible idiots to sign off on the idea.
By all accounts, she’s a better sailor than 99.9% of the posters to this forum are, or ever will be; probably WELL versed in the temerpament of the southern seas at this time of year, and had enough faith in her abilities at sea to forge ahead. And, but for an unforseeable equipment failure she’d be heralded as a fine young heroine; an example of America’s finest, and it is a measure of the commentator, not the adventurer, that a broken mast is all it has taken to, in many minds, transform the girl from a young heroine into a fool.
Wrong century.
Warfare's just a tad different. And Farragut wasn't 16.
The sea hasn't changed at all, but you're right about Farragut's age; he was twelve when he accepted his first command.
I never advocated that anybody from the government should do anything to these people...just pointed out that this was an incredibly wreckless, publicity hound stunt.
This couple should be pariahs. They should not be celebrated for this. Don’t watch their reality show. Don’t donate to their web-site to recover their boat. Don’t feed their attention addiction.
Look, there will always be a push and pull with government intrusion on children. I like home schooling...but when I see the police drag a dozen filthy, illiterate, children out of a home...that’s not home schooling.
I guess I’d be alot more sympathetic to the personal liberty argument, if these people were really able to do this without affecting anyone else...but they just incurred a $300k bill, and the wife has snarkily declared that she’s not paying. Looks like the Aussie gubment (translation: taxpayers) get to pony up for that bill.
Now I have heard, on this board, several calls for Abbey to try again. What? Would people really expect the Aussies to rescue her again?
If they want to be stupid and risk their daughter’s life, they should at least be able to pay for it themselves, right? Pretty conservative thought, right?
Now, I’m going to use one of Rush’s questions. How young is too young? Could a 12 year old girl try this? 10? 8? 4? Why not? As arbitrary as it seems, there has to be a bright dividing line between childhood and adulthood. Its arbitrary for sure, but its 18 in our present society.
Boring? What? The trip or the show?
I think we just need to call the Waaaaahmbulance!!!
Maybe even Big Brutha will be drivin’ it.
You sent me a third unhsolicited FReepmail
“Praise someone in public...chide them in private”
No personally I dont stab FReepers in the back in the FReepMail...
So if you have anything to say to me...
and especially since you seem to think I must be “chided”
Please have the guts and maturity to say it to my face out here...
(Smile)
:)
Tennessee Nana
What should be illegal is reality TV shows involving minor children. Then Balloon Boy would have no need to hide, Abby could have sailed when it was safer, Octo-Mom would have thought twice about having 14 children, Kate whats-her-face’s face wouldn’t be all over the place....
I was a boy Midshipman (technically a Cadet Midshipman), one of the last in the Commonwealth.
They let us join the Navy as children. They let us do a lot of things as children.
But they also always made sure that there was somebody there who had a chance of getting us out of trouble in an emergency.
That’s how it was for the 300 years that boys were allowed to train as officers. It’s a very different situation from the one Ms Sunderland found herself in.
Adults should allow children the chance to fall - but always be there to try and catch them when they do.
Right. Based on a pile of compounding suppositions as to the unknown motives of people you've never met.
...but when I see the police drag a dozen filthy, illiterate, children out of a home...
...an event that happens almost — what — twice a decade (maybe?), and has exactly ZERO relevance to this story?
...but they just incurred a $300k bill, and the wife has snarkily declared that she’s not paying.
Not that she's been asked to. I seem to recall news reports quoting Aussie authorities saying that this sort of rescue effort isn't something they plant to, or intend to, charge for. Not that they wouldn't accept remuneration, I suppose, just that it wasn't a requirement.
I have heard, on this board, several calls for Abbey to try again. What? Would people really expect the Aussies to rescue her again?
Are you expecting — even hoping? — that if she does try again, she'll encounter bad weather again, have another equipment failure again, and need to be rescued again? Do you REALLY want to go negative like that?
Yeah, if she tried again and got into trouble down under, I expect the Aussies would head out and pick her up again. Probably some of those guys would clap her on the back, and give her props for her indomitable spirit.
As arbitrary as it seems, there has to be a bright dividing line between childhood and adulthood. Its arbitrary for sure, but its 18 in our present society.
Emphasis on the "arbitrary" part. And, don't look now, but Obamacare just bumped it all the way up to 26. Whereas we've got an arbitrary line drawn, it still MUST remain the purview of parents to decide with their childern what it is they will and will not allow their kids to do.
Look, at the day's end, my point's NOT to be snide and disparaging of people for disagreeing with the decision Abby and her parents made, it's that I SO much HATE to see normally good-hearted conservative people leaping into the place of being wild-eyed detractors of the very brand of risk-taking spirit of adventure, perseverance, grit and determination that forged the iron reinforcements in the Foundations of this great Republic.
Apart from the kind of intrepid, "into the teeth of potentially deadly danger" determination that Abby has demonstrated, the United States wouldn't ever have achieved half the stature it did at the height of its greatness. And, if that greatness is to be snatched back from the jaws of socialist oblivion, then future leaders with big visions and the guts to lay it all on the line to make those visions real are exactly the kinds of leaders we're really going to desperately need. But we're going to have a hard time building leaders like that if we make a habit of shooting them dead just because life dealt them a wounding blow on their way up.
In some measure, all of the criticism directed at Abby and her parents is a shameful manifestation of conservatives' willingness to cut off our nose to spite our face, and I'll have no part in it.
Actually, a lot of the criticism is well deserved ... if one values life.
TAKE A HIKE TO ALL YOU ON THE OTHER THREAD WHO CALLED US STATISTS AND SOCIALISTS AND WANTED PROOF THIS CHILD WAS BEING USED!!!
THERE IS YOUR PROOF! NOW GO BACK TO YOUR “FREEDOM FANTASY LAND”.
I thought that right when it happened!!
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